Another Water Report

[cooper]

Hi Everyone,

I just got back a water report from Ward Labs and wanted to see what you guys thought about it. I do have a Pelican Whole House salt-free water softener/filter and here's what's left over after it passes through. I currently treat all of my brewing water with acid down to 5.5 prior to brewing and add the dark grains in a vorlauf. I apologize if the formatting is a little off...

pH - 7.5

Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) Est, ppm - 311

Electrical Conductivity, mmho/cm - 0.52

Cations / Anions, me/L - 5.4 / 5.3

Sodium, Na - 18ppm

Potassium, K - 4ppm

Calcium, Ca - 55ppm

Magnesium, Mg - 22ppm

Total Hardness, CaCO3 - 229ppm

Nitrate, NO3-N - 6.2ppm (SAFE)

Sulfate, SO4-S - 13ppm

Chloride, Cl - 35ppm

Carbonate, CO3 < 1.0

Bicarbonate, HCO3 - 181ppm

Total Alkalinity, CaCO3 - 149ppm

Total Phosphorus, P - 0.27ppm

Total Iron, Fe < 0.01

"<" - Not Detected / Below Detection Limit

 

[mabrungard]

That is a great starting point, excepting for the alkalinity. That would require neutralization for most brewing. Learning to use an acid in your brewing will be a great asset.

 

[ajdelange]

Treating your water with acid to mash pH zeroes out your alkalinity but introduces 3 mEq/L of the acid anion into the beer. Holding all the dark malts means you will need additional acid to hit mash pH. This acid is required to overcome the alkalinity of the base malt. Witholding the dark grains is a little risky as they will contribute their acidity when they are added. Assuming that you got the mash pH about right, kettle pH tends to track into the desired band without extra acid addition. If you add extra acid in the form of dark malts it stands to reason that kettle pH is going to drop lower than it would if you included the dark grains in the main mash. This may or may not represent a problem. I have no experience with this. Were I to contemplate undertaking this approach I wouldn't want to do it without the comfort of a pH meter close at hand.

 

[cooper]

Thanks for the info. I need to do an experiment where I brew a batch that uses some dark grains and add them during the mash and the other one during vorlauf only and see if I can tell an actual difference. My guess is probably not. I should be able to get away with a little less acid at least by adding them to the mash. That's where Martins calculator really helps out and then verify with the pH tester

 

[ajdelange]

Calculators can be extremely helpful for planning, seeing how things work, where the protons flow etc. but unless they have the three critical malt parameters (DI water mash pH, buffering capacity, buffering capacity slope), or at least two of them, for each of the malts you are using (not the same named malt from another maltster from another harvest from another region) then they cannot predict mash pH accurately (how accurate is accurate enough is, of course arguable). No spreadsheet or calculator has this because no one has the data to put into them. We want the malsters to provide that data and were working on that but don't hold your breath. That is why a pH meter is so important especially if you delve into a realm for which the calculators are not designed (as you are doing in withholding the dark malts). These comments are not, BTW, intended to discourage exploration of this technique but rather to insure that you have the kit you need to do so.

 

[cooper]

I agree. I like to use the calculators to get me in the ball park then use the pH tester during the mash to get real numbers